Agents are light-weight Java processes that run on the agent machine. Agents allow the distribution of tasks for performance and multi-platform support. The agent contacts the server whenever the agent process is started. Since the agent communicates with the central server, it need not be on the same network as the central server. However, the agent must be able to open a socket connection to the server. By default, all communication between the central server and the agent is not secure. Communication may be secured using SSL.

Agents are light-weight Java processes that run on the agent machine. Agents allow the distribution of tasks for performance and multi-platform support. The agent contacts the server whenever the agent process is started. Since the agent communicates with the central server, it need not be on the same network as the central server. However, the agent must be able to open a socket connection to the server. By default, all communication between the central server and the agent is not secure. Communication may be secured using SSL.

An agent is a lightweight process that runs on a host and communicates with the Serena Release Automation server. Agents manage the resources that are the actual deployment targets.

Agent Filters are used to select one or more agent(s) at run time and to monitor the quiet period.

An agent pool helps you organize and manage agents installed in different environments.

The new communication relay acts as a proxy for agents (which perform work on behalf of the AnthillPro server) that are located behind a firewall or in another network location. Available under separate download.

An agent relay is used to communicate with remote agent. An agent relay requires that only a single machine in the remote network contact the server.

AHPTool is a command-line interface for AnthillPro that provides communication between agent-side commands, scripting and the AnthillPro central server. AHPTool is focused on setting and retrieving information from the AnthillPro server in the context of a running workflow: It can be used to look up or set properties at the system, step, request, job, Build Life and agent levels. AHPTool can upload and retrieve Test, Coverage, Analytics, or Issue data in the form of an XML document to AnthillPro -- making it an excellent integration point for writing your own plug-in or script.

An any agent filter selects the first available agent. Also, it returns all online agents in the environment, ordered by a combination of current load and throughput metric.

An application is the mechanism that initiates component deployment; they bring together components with their deployment target and orchestrates multi-componet deployments. An Application must have one component.

An application process can run automatically, manually, or on a user-defined schedule. An application process can orchestrate the entire process including putting servers on-and-off line for load-balancing as required.

The application security report provides information about user roles and privileges defined for Serena Release Automation-managed applications.

For any artifact associated with this project, the files produced by a workflow published as the artifact.

Artifacts are files, images, databases, configuration materials, or anything else associated with a software project.

Manages how long you will keep the artifacts in order to save disk space.

An Artifact Set is a label for a collection of build artifacts. Artifact Sets are used to define dependency relationships: Any project that another project depends on generates one or more collections of files used by the dependent project.

Authentication Realms are used to determine a user’s identity within an Authorization Realm.

Authorization reals are used to associate Users with Roles and to determine user access to AnthillPro.

Displays the data in a bar chart embedded in HTML. Data must all be numeric.

Blackouts are set per-environment, per-application. Once set, no deployments (nor Snapshots) can be scheduled to occur in that Environment. Any previously scheduled deployments to the Environment will fail if they fall within the blackout date you set.

The default environment containing all agents used for pure-build processes.

represents all the transformations a build has gone through, and the processes such as deployments and testing that the artifacts have undergone.

Build Life Links are used to pass the URL of resources outside of AnthillPro to the Build Life.

When set as a workflow property, the value will get pushed to the Build Life originating workflow before the build begins.

typically used to hold variable data for builds or to create an audit trail. Once the property is set, and the build has run, the Build Life Property will be visible on the Build Life page.

Build Life Tools- Build Life Tools are available through the UI to help you diagnose problems and mange Build Lives.

The property will get pushed to the build request before the build begins.

A build workflow defines the process for running jobs.

Could reduce bandwidth and improve AnthillPro’s response time. This is especially helpful in distributed development environments: the proxy can improve performance for users at off-site locations because commonly used pages are loaded from the locally stored cache.

Cleanup configures AnthillPro to periodically cleanup old Build Lives, build request and miscellaneous jobs generated by a project. Cleanup is on a per-project basis, so every project that uses the same Life-Cycle Model will have the same policy. To clean up the Build Life, the user can delete, inactivate, or archive the Build Life.

determines when to cleanup build lives. The cleanup of build lives is base on the status the build life has achieved.

Specifies when to delete information about old Build Lives and other task associated with the project.

A Cleanup Schedule kicks-off the Cleanup.

A Cleanup Build Request determines when build request are cleaned up.

Cloning an instance of your AnthillPro server will allow you to change scripts, optimize processes, improve build performance, move the server, etc., without having to experiment on the production server.

CodeStation is the name of AnthillPro’s artifact repository management and access tool set. It provides support of dependencies of third-party tool kits and software libraries. CodeStation is also responsible for bringing the dependency management lookup and retrieval utilities to the individual developer.

CodeStation is Serena Release Automation's artifact repository. It provides secure and tamper-proof storage. It tracks artifact versions as they change and maintains an archive for each artifact.

This feature determines how long unused artifacts remain in the cache.

A component represents deployable items along with user-defined processes that operate on it. Components are deployed to a resource by agents.

A component inventory tells you what version of the component is running on a resource.

A component process is a series of user-defined steps that operate on a components artifacts.

A component security report provides information about user roles and privileges defined for components.

Component templates enable you save and reuse component processes and properties. Components based on templates inherit the template's properties and process.

A Conflict Strategy allows you to control how AnthillPro acts when a conflict occurs within the dependency tree.

A cron schedule may be configured to consider more complex criteria than a simple interval.

Basic property type. Displays a secured field for the user (either the property name or default value) when running a build.

Specifies the specific artifacts, including version, from other projects that should be retrieved in order to support the workflow. Also specifies the artifacts from other projects and the directory in the checked-out source that those artifacts should be placed in.

A deployment is the process of moving software through various preproduction stages to final production.

A deployment average duration report provides the average deployment time for applications executed during a user-specified reporting period.

A deployment count report provides information about the number of deployments executed during a user-specified reporting period.

The deployment detail report provides information about deployments executed during a user-specified reporting period.

A deployment report provides information about user roles and privileges defined with the Serena Release Automation security system.

A deployment total duration report provides total deployment for applications executed during a user-specified period.

The process editor's work area, where plug-in steps are configured and process flows defined.

The Dev-kit provides comprehensive documentation on AnthillPro scripting, remoting, using SOAP-based web services with AnthillPro, the AHPTool (command-line tool) and creating your own Plug-in for AnthillPro.

A digital certificate is a cryptographically signed document intended to assure others about the identity of the certificate's owner.

Distributed Servers is a complimentary product to AnthillPro designed to reduce the reliance on WAN connections by performing all the heavy lifting (builds, etc.) on local networks. There are three main components to Distributed Servers: Distributed Web Interface, Codestation 2.0, and Agent Relay.

The interface mirrors the AnthillPro server, providing the same information and functionality as the main server, for AnthillPro users.

enable users to set a standard for the available attributes a user can provide when executing a resource. Using an empty-value property gives users the option to define a required value or simply pass a blank value that AnthillPro will effectively ignore.

An environment is a user-definded collection of one or more resources that host an application. At least one environment must be associated with the process before the process can be executed.

An environment is a partition grid of agents that is specific for different stages of a project life-cycle.

determines the set of environments that project workflows may be executed on. Each environment group must contain at least one environment.

An environment inventory tells you both what versions of any given component is running on a particular resource.

Environment Properties are used to set default values for a particular environment.

An environment security report provides information about user roles and privileges defined for environments.

Event Triggers use scripts to create an Event Filter that listens to events passing through the AnthillPro Event Service. When the Event Script detects an event, it can then trigger another action by the AnthillPro server.

Fixed Agent Filters always select a specific agent within the environment. If the requested agent is locked or can’t receive more work, the request will be queued until the agent frees up.

A full version contains all component artifacts.

The Guest User Account gives anonymous access to AnthillPro, and does not require a user name or password at login.

The plug-ins enable developers to view the current activity and state of projects, start new builds, map their projects to projects in AnthillPro, and resolve the project’s dependency artifacts.

An incremental version contains only artifacts that have been modified since the previous version was created.

Related projects do not need to know about each other for independent scheduling. A dependent project starts each build by gathering the most recent artifacts from its dependencies.

Allows for dependency relationships between concurrently developed AnthillPro projects.

Regularly fires after a fixed interval of time.

A job is a series of steps detailing how to get something done.

Use the Job-execution property type if the value, default value or options are to be generated by a job that executes on an agent.

Job iteration properties are configured after iterating a job. They are typically used to set parameters for a single job that is run many times, with a slightly different parameter each time.

Job Iterations are used to run the same job multiple times.

A Job Wizard assists in the creation of build jobs. The Wizard takes you through the steps to configure the builder and the publisher required by the job, and is the best way to ensure your build job will be configured successfully. The Build Life is a map of (1) what occurred during the build; (2) the processes that were performed on the generated artifacts; (3) where the build artifacts ended up.

A Library Job is a way for you to create template jobs. Once a Library Job has been configured, it can be used by multiple projects or can be turned into a project-specific job.

The Library Workflow can only use library jobs as part of its definition.

The Life-Cycle Build provides a wealth of information and visibility into the build and release cycle. It is defined by its Life-Cycle Model, Environments, and Build workflow.

The Life-Cycle Model provides a template for managing the dependencies, artifacts, deployments, etc, associated with every build of the project. They are reusable, allowing you to apply the same standards to any similar project.

A lightweight directory access protocol (LDAP) is a widely used protocol used to access distributed directory information over the internet protocol (I.P) networks.

A lock is routinely used to ensure that processes do not interfere with one another.

A Lockable Resource specifies a resource that might be used by multiple workflows, gives it a name and forces arbitrary workflows to run one at a time or in small groups.

Network Settings are used to configure communication between the AnthillPro server and agents.

Notifications inform the recipient of the status of a CI build.

Notifications play a role in approving deployments: Serena Release Automation can be configured to send out an e-mail to either a single individual or to a group or people (based on their security role) notifying them that they need to approve a requested deployment.

Notification Schemes determine who to notify of build status, what conditions to notify them on, and what mechanism to notify them with. sets rules determining what groups of users are sent which kind of notification about specific events.

A notification scheme enables Serena Release Automation to send out notifications based on events. For example, the Default Notification scheme will send out an e-mail when an Application Deployment fails or succeeds.

Notification Templates are Velocity templates that take information about the build and produce a document.

Operational Projects provide a simplified interface that allows AnthillPro users to execute ancillary tasks not easily run during a build, deployment, etc., workflow.

Permissions associate the role, resource, and an action that may be performed on the resource. Typical actions include the ability to read or view the resource, the ability to write to or modify the resource, the ability to modify the security settings for a resource, or the ability to execute the resource.

A plug-in is the integration with third-party tools.

Preflight Builds allow developers to run a test build in the authoritative build environment before committing their changes to source control.

Processes play a coordination role. They are authored using a visual drag-n-drop editor.

A process editor is a visual drag-and-drop editor that enables you to drag process steps onto the design space and configure them as you go.

A processing property is a way to add user-supplied information to a process.

Project Environment Properties are automatically placed as environment variables for all commands run in the target environment.

Project Properties are used for all workflows regardless of the target environment.

Properties identify various properties that must be specified when the workflow is executed. Properties are used to manage variables passed into commands, agent filters, and custom stamping algorithm templates.

A proxy resource is a resource effected by an agent on a host other than the one where the resource is located.

A Pull Build will build every dependency that is out of date prior to building the top level of a project.

Pure builds take the source as input and transforms it into artifacts. In AnthillPro, it generates the Build Life.

Push Builds perform the minimum number of builds, in the correct order, to ensure that a change to a component does not break anything that depends on it directly or transitively. A push build can become resource intensive.

Push Scheduling are used when an originating workflow builds, the workflows that depend on it automatically build.

Quiet Periods are configured on the project, and play an integral part in ensuring that the source code AnthillPro obtains from the SCM contains a consistent set of changes. The quiet period is a measure of time that must pass without anyone committing changes to the source.

Read permissions allow a user to resolve/download the artifacts associated with a Build Life.

A relay server enables network-to-network communication.

A remote agent is an agent that will communicate with the server via an agent relay.

Reports provide information about system activity.

Repository Triggers are used for Continuous Integration builds. Once the trigger is active for a workflow, every commit of source changes will initiate a build.

A resource is a user-defined construct based on Serena Release Automation's architectural model. A resource represents a deployment target.

A resource group is a group of resources used to help organize and manage the agent installed in a different environment.

A resource security report provides information about user roles and privileges defined for resources.

A role enables you to further refine how a resource is utilized, and is similar to subresources.

A Schedules determines when events such as builds, cleanups, backups, etc., are automatically run by the system. Once a schedule has been created, it may be used by many different AnthillPro resources.

A Scheduled Trigger runs on its own timer that pools the SCM for changes. If changes are detected, the build is registered with the schedule and kicked off when the schedule fires. Scheduled Triggers give the option to force a build regardless of whether source changes have occurred.

A schema is a visual representation of the different parts of Serena Release Automation that may be secured. Each Schema interacts with users indirectly, through the role.

the script library is used to create, organize, and provide security around often-used AnthillPro scripts. The Script Library is most helpful for large organizations, allowing them to ensure that only the appropriate team members can modify a script.

Scripted value properties are properties where the value, default value or options are generated by a script that is executed before workflow execution.

A scripted agent filter selects agent based on an agent filter script.

A secure socket layer (SSL) enables clients and servers to communicate securely by encrypting all communications.

Security Permissions allows users to determine who can set security for the artifact set.

A security report provides information about user roles and privileges.

A Security Setting is used to configure access to the Anthill Server setting for configuration and artifact management.

Server proxies enable you to access servers/repositories that are on external networks.

A snapshot is a collection of specific component versions, usually versions that are known to work together.

Source Configuration identifies exactly which source code should be retrieved from a repository.

A Stamp is a configurable name for the build number, build identifier, or version number used to identify a build. This allows you to mimic your strategies.

Stamp Context Scripts generate values for variables in the stamp context when creating a stamp (for builds, etc.).

For every stamp style in the project’s stamp style group, one must specify what stamping strategy will be used. A typical stamp style group might specify for development builds to a version number and strategy for incrementing that number.

Stamp Styles are used to apply different stamps to a single build, and allow you to help track a build throughout its life-cycle.

A Stamp Style Group creates common names for types of stamps.

A Status Group is a set of common names for statuses.

Stateless means the server retains little session information between requests, and each request contains all information needed to handle it.

A subresource enables you to apply logical identifiers or categories within any given group.

A switch step enables you to create conditional processes.

The System Tray Monitor provides feedback directly to the desktop, without having to open or refresh a browser.

The System property is used to set default values for a particular property for all workflows and project system wide.

Template Reports are good for generating tabular data in one or more types of output.

A Trigger is an automated mechanism for kicking off a workflow.

A uncontrolled environment is an environment that does not contain approvals approval gates.

Serena Release Automation can use user impersonation when an agent must execute a command for which it might not otherwise have permission.

Velocity Reports are good for customizing the AnthillPro UI.

A version is set each time a component changes. There are two types of versions a full version and an incremental version.

A Workflow Definition defines which job should be run, species the order of jobs, as well as the elements to be run in parallel.

Workflow Priorities allow you to determine the order in which workflows run. Use workflow priorities to determine which workflow will run first.

Workflow properties are used to send a build to a particular platform when writing native code for multiple platforms.

A workflow request context is a collection of requests for workflows that are processed together.

A Workflow Task allow you to set up manual gates, etc., that must be performed.

There are two major categories of work flow tools: priorities and requests.

The Workflow Request is the first action taken by the server when executing an originating or secondary workflow.